


SU Human AU (working title...)

by EverestV



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Roommates/Housemates, F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-02
Updated: 2017-02-02
Packaged: 2018-09-21 14:58:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9553673
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EverestV/pseuds/EverestV





	

Pearl was exhausted. Completely and totally. She practically had to drag herself up the stairs to her apartment, one shoulder drooping under the weight of her bag, head hung low, hair falling into her face. She got to the door and it was unlocked—a small mercy.

“Hello, Lapis,” her voice wavered through the front hall as she stepped inside, locked the door behind her, began unraveling herself from scarf to coat to sweater to boots. A muffled sound of affirmation was the only response. “I’m kinda glad I gave you a key now.”

“You love me. I know. And you’ll love me even more when you see what I got you.”

Dutifully following the sound of her voice, trudging into the kitchen, Pearl let a soft smile float to the surface when she saw her friend at the table, sitting in front of a feast of splayed-out takeout. “Shit, did your paycheck come in early?”

Lapis’ face scrunched up in a frown. “It’s Friday, Pearl. Payday as per usual.”

“Oh, sorry, I’m...I’m very tired. This looks amazing, though. Thank you.” She dropped her bag and started making a plate for herself, trying to ignore Lapis’ concerned little huff. “Is Garnet coming over? We can’t possibly eat all this ourselves.”

“Uh, I’m sure you’d benefit greatly from an excess of leftovers. I’ve seen your fridge.” Lapis said, mouth half-full, counting the takeout boxes as if they would suddenly add up to three more than she bought. “But no, Garnet said she had to go...uh, well, babysit for, um...a coworker or something that she—”

“For Rose? You mean?” Pearl interrupted with as much of a nonchalant expression as she could muster. She didn’t look up from her food, she didn’t need to. She already knew Lapis was watching for her next move. “You can say her name, you know, it’s not a crime. I mean, it’s been a year now, it’s...it’s fine.”

“Right, right, sure. It’s just so hard to tell these days. Or any day for that matter.” Lapis’ remark was biting but Pearl was used to it and the two lapsed into a tense silence. That is, until Lapis let out a soft laugh.

Pearl stared at her otherwise rather serious friend, smiling tenderly at her phone. “What?”

“Oh nothing.” Lapis replied, pausing for a moment. “Or no, actually, since you insist on being ‘fine’, Garnet just sent me a picture of Steven. Say what you want about the parents, but this tiny little ball of pink is absolutely precious.”

Scrunching up her nose, making a low sound in her throat, Pearl turned back to her food. “I’ll take your word for it.”

“Wait, you’ve never seen him? I mean, not even pictures?” Pearl shook her head without looking up. “You’re ridiculous and a terrible liar. ‘Not a crime to mention her name’, what a load of crap. He’s a baby who’s done nothing to you, hasn’t even met you. Just look at him.”

“No thank you. I’m not interested.” Avoiding Lapis’ outstretched phone like the plague, Pearl stood and began cleaning up, ignoring the protests from her friend when she took her plate away too.

Lapis huffed in frustration. “It’s not gonna kill you to look at _him_ , it can’t possibly—”

“You wouldn’t know, alright?” Pearl slammed a plastic container against the counter. “And to be honest, I really couldn’t care less about her child if I tried. Just leave it alone.”

“No, this has gone on long enough! You can’t just ignore someone’s entire existence like this, not when she was such a big part of yours. You’re not saving yourself, you’re just making this whole thing worse for your—”

“Lapis, please.” The words weren’t presented as a plea, but squeezed past gritted teeth into the iron structure of a command.

And so Lapis made a decision. She allowed another period of silence to pass before speaking up in a much more benign tone. “You know what you need?”

“Don’t you _dare_ try to set me up again, Lapis Lazuli, I still can’t stand to be in the same room as...well, I’m sure she’s changed her name by now.”

“ _Jasper_ has only spoke your praises since you and _they_ went out that _one_ time. You really should give them another chance, I swear they’re just a big softie once you...I mean, eventually.” Lapis shook her head. “Irrelevant and besides the point. I was gonna say you need a roommate, something big like that to get your mind off things, and seeing as that you’re never home anyway, you won’t even have to like them for it to work.”

Pearl massaged the bridge of her nose, slouching in the pale light of the fridge. “Why do I get the feeling that you’ve been thinking about this for a while, that this _hasn’t_ just come to mind?”

“You know what? I’ll take care of the whole thing for you. I’ll let you know when we’ve got a few good offers and we can interview them together. I promise you’ll have full veto power, but only after you’ve met some of them.”

“Lapis—”

“And if you go through with this whole thing, I’ll consider helping you rid Rose completely and totally from your life. Scout’s honor.”

“No, _Lapis_ —”

“Lapis yes. It’s settled. Now go take a nap before you fall asleep where you’re standing.”

\---

“I’m sorry, why am I here again? I thought you said Pearl hated me.”

“We’re the muscle.” Garnet offered, but the response wasn’t enough to satisfy Jasper. Instead, they waited for a more complete answer from the one in charge of this ridiculous-sounding plan.

Lapis just patted her much-taller-friend’s head, reaching up considerably to do so. “Pearl doesn’t hate you. I don’t suggest taking things too personally when it comes to her.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“Fine, fine.” Lapis took a sip from her latte as Garnet dug into her scone. Jasper waited with their smoothie still untouched in front of them. “You two kinda are the muscle.”

“Wha— what kind of people do you expect to be meeting exactly?!”

“It’s not that, I’ve just been reading that some healthy intimidation doesn’t hurt anything when looking for a roommate for your best friend.”

“She’s very protective of Pearl, if you didn’t notice.”

Jasper scoffed at Garnet’s clarification. “No, I know, believe me. I got the speech when she was trying to set us up. I can’t imagine what that would be like with two giants glaring at you added to the picture.”

“You know, I never mentioned any glaring, but I’m glad you’re committing to the part.” Lapis rubbed two circles on Jasper’s forearm with a smile. Jasper returned it weakly.

Garnet nudged Lapis’ arm after a moment. “Think that’s our first guy,” she said, motioning toward a lanky teen hanging around the front door of the coffee shop.

“That kid looks like he’s in high school,” Jasper protested, “he can’t possibly be in need of a roommate.” Garnet shrugged and Lapis glanced at her crumpled-up list.

“Well if that’s Buck Dewey, he’s in college. Technically. He’s 18, but...” Lapis refused to look up at the lost teen again, feeling her shoulders drop in frustration. “I didn’t realize Buck was a guy...”

“What do you mean you didn’t realize— what did you put in the ad?!” Jasper’s eyes were wide, flicking back and forth between Lapis’ nonchalance, Garnet’s disinterest, and Buck’s idleness.

“Um...”

“I believe the exact words were ‘roommate wanted, no heterosexuals’ and then just ‘swimminlapsroundu@gmail.com’.” Garnet answered for her and Jasper stood with a curt sigh.

“Leave it to you to find the wrong kind of gay. Ridiculous. Hey, kid! Are you Dewey?”

\---

Pearl was tired—what else was new these days?—but today was a gift. She had to keep telling herself that. Her last class of the day almost never got cancelled, the professor had literally taught through a blizzard once, but today there was a death in the family. She probably shouldn’t be too happy about that in hindsight.

Either way, she was racing down the street from the bus station, cigarette held tight between her teeth, trying desperately to ignore how ruffled her hair was getting in the wind. She was almost there, almost home, about to fall into her own bed for the first time in weeks. Maybe it wasn’t one of her safest decisions, but she took the stairs two at a time with careless abandon (hey, she had snuffed out her cig outside, so at least she wasn’t running with her mouth full).

Only when she was halfway up the last flight did she consider slowing down, suddenly noticing a small and stocky stranger listlessly leaning up against the wall on Pearl’s floor. She— _or maybe they? I should probably ask before assuming—_ seemed content in keeping their attention on their phone and Pearl took the opportunity to stare without caution. It certainly was an interesting sight before her.

The stranger wore a pair of faded jeans that were especially threadbare at the knees and so long that they covered most of the owner’s sneakers, despite obviously being rolled up several times. The college varsity jacket worn on top, promoting a relatively successful college soccer team, was similarly oversized, the hemline ending mid-thigh. It was almost comical to see this tiny figure look even smaller underneath such large, heavy clothes. But it was the white v-neck that really took center-stage in the picture, showcasing a rainbow-patterned bowl of salsa and the words, “pico de gayo”.

Pearl chuckled a little, still in motion up the stairs, and the stranger looked up. One darkly ringed eye peeked out from the fringed bangs that hung from her knitted cap— _has to be a she, has to be, at least I hope so, shit I hope so—_ and the resulting smile that blossomed was like a mini starburst, freckles dotting her dark skin like constellations.

Then Pearl was falling, mostly in the literal sense. Tripping over her own two feet and then the top stair to add insult injury, the normally graceful dancer was reduced to a mess of flailing limbs under such a heavy but curious gaze.

Except she didn’t hit the floor. Because then the stranger was there in the next moment, arms outstretched, phone dropped and abandoned somewhere behind them, catching Pearl with impressive reflexes. Pearl looked up, already comfortably settled in the embrace that held her, as if on instinct, and blushed. So did the stranger.

Neither felt the need to say anything, though. Neither felt the need to move. The two simply stared at each other with a soft kind of shock and then an easy acceptance and then with open, exploring expressions. Like they’d soon be able to communicate telepathically if just given enough time to stare at each other.

When voices began making their way up the stairs, the two still hadn’t moved.

“And we _are_ saying the new prospect is the right kind of gay this time, right?”

“Are you kidding? That’s all Lapis would ask the poor girl. ‘Are you gay? As in not straight, strictly and very _non_ -heterosexual? Like totally into girls and all that jazz?’ The promise of a shirt as proof was the only thing that would shut her up.”

“Shit, can you blame me? No one told me there were so many _male_ gays in the area. It was actually kinda enlightening.”

“Whatever. We at least know more about her than the other people who replied to the ad, if you can even _call_ a scrap of paper that. She’s a friend of a friend so it’s already confirmed she’s not an axe murderer.”

“Oh good.”

“You two are so pessimistic, I swear. It’ll go fine, I have a good feeling about this one. I bet you by the end of the week those two will already—”

The trio reached the last flight of stairs and stared at the motionless two. That’s when Pearl fell, slipping through the stranger’s suddenly limp fingers.

“Oh. Pearl, you’re home earlier than expected.” Garnet sounded amused and unsurprised.

“Shit, w-we um...we weren’t gonna let a total stranger into your apartment or anything, Pearl, we just...er, good to see you found the place, Amethyst...” Jasper was desperately trying to keep their priorities straight, trying to figure out which was the bigger threat.

“Oh my fuck, I called it. They’re already in love. You both owe me ten bucks.” Lapis was more smug than usual.

Pearl let out a short huff from the floor and closed her eyes against a building headache, closed her eyes in hopes of shutting out the obvious absence of contact against her skin. _I just wanted to come home and take a fucking nap._


End file.
